


Legacy

by LJMouse



Series: Gifts & Prompts [5]
Category: Transformers - All Media Types, Transformers: Prime
Genre: Injured Sparkling, M/M, Mechpreg, Premature Birth
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-16
Updated: 2017-01-16
Packaged: 2018-09-18 00:03:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,328
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9352421
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LJMouse/pseuds/LJMouse
Summary: Commission for CosmicatRatchet never knew he was carrying. When he goes into premature labor, at first he believes it's just bad fuel or a misaligned t-cog. His sparkling pays the price for Ratchet's neglect of his own health.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Cosmicat](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cosmicat/gifts).



> This store was commissioned by Cosmicat.

He _hurt._

Ratchet paused in the hallway, jaw clenching and armor clamping tight to his frame in response to a cramping pain in his midsection.

His transformation cog then made a strange twisting motion. He'd felt it many times over the last several years, and he kept meaning to get Knock Out to help him track the problem down, but he'd been too busy. At his age, minor systems malfunctions were to be expected. 

His cog -- he _thought_ it was his cog acting up -- jerked again in his frame, and sudden agony made him gasp. His fuel pump whined hard, and his fuel intake tube spasmed. For a horrified moment, he thought he was going to purge in the hall.

"Doc. You okay?" Arcee said, as she came up behind him.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah." The pain passed as swiftly as it arrived. He straightened up after a moment and let out a sharp, explosive sigh. He still felt nauseous. "I'm fine. Bad fuel, I think."

"'Kay," she said, sounding dubious. "Let me know if there's anything I can help you with."

"I'm fine," he said. "I just need a good night's recharge."

 

* * *

 

He thought a hot shower in the wash racks might help the cramps and perhaps ease the strange rippling movements of his internals that kept wracking his frame, but it didn't. He didn't think it was anything serious -- bad fuel was at the top of his list, followed by a worsening of the misalignment of his t-cog -- but it was extremely uncomfortable. 

Grumbling to himself, he finally curled up on his side on the berth, and tried to sleep. The cramps seemed to come at random intervals. He found it hard to recharge, and considered calling Knock Out. If the issue was his transformation cog, he couldn't realign it himself simply because he couldn't see or reach it.

However, Knock Out was undoubtedly in deep recharge right now and this was something which could wait. Nobody had ever died of a slipped t-cog, even if every mech so afflicted who stumbled through the door of his clinic _thought_ he was dying.

Primus, he missed Optimus. One of Optimus's little-known skills was his ability to give an incredible massage. Right now, he would have given anything to have Optimus's thick fingers moving over his body, soothing away the tension and realigning every torqued component in his frame.

Honestly? He just missed Optimus.

Ratchet squeezed his optics shut, wondering why he felt so emotional now. It had been almost exactly five years since Optimus had sacrificed himself to save their world. Sudden, fierce, grief welled in his spark. He'd give anything to see Optimus one last time ... to press into his arms, to feel that powerful field and to hear the rumble of his voice.

He remembered the last time they'd been together, alone. Optimus had held him tight and close and made love to him for hours. Days later, Optimus had died. Sometimes, he wondered if Optimus had a premonition even then of his future, because Optimus had urged him to ‘be sure to take care of yourself if anything happens to me’’ several times.

Grief, almost as painful as the spasms wracking his frame, seized Ratchet's spark. They'd rejuvenated Cybertron, and brought peace to their world, but Optimus had not lived to see it. It just wasn't fair.

 

* * *

 

He finally fell into recharge, and it was surprisingly deep. He was exhausted, both from the pain and from the relentless hard work associated with the rebuilding of Cybertron. Mecha were returning, and they all needed medical care. He hadn't had a good night's recharge, much less any free time, for years.

He was underfueled, too. They all were, but Ratchet's work in the surgical wards was surprisingly hard and physical. Also, aside from the chronic shortage of energon that plagued Cybertron, he sometimes forgot to fuel and when he did he frequently gave part of his rations to his patients and his assistants. While hunger often plagued his processor, making him especially cranky, it wasn't the first nor would it be the last time in his existence that low energy levels was an issue. He had long experience working through it.

The combination of exhaustion and low fuel finally pushed him into several hours of oblivion.

Agony woke him. His t-cog spun wildly in ways he'd never felt before, and his fuel tank felt like it was both in the wrong place and splitting open. His spark spun in his chest. His processor ... he couldn't think!

He screamed with pain and fear.

There was something wrong with his processor. He couldn't open his own diagnostic protocols.

A message flashed up on his HUD.

 

> **> >Initiating carrier protocols**

 

_What?_

 

> **> >Installation at 4% ... 5% ... 6% ...**
> 
> **> >Do not shut down**

 

Frantically, he sent a command to abort the process. The code that had launched was a huge script, and it was bogging down his processor. He couldn't think. 'Carrier protocols' sounded like the gestational script that ran while mechanisms were delivering a sparkling, but he wasn't carrying. It had to be a virus.

He tried again to cancel the code. From some addled corner of his memory banks, he summoned up a medical override code. His HUD flashed red and his entire processor crashed.

 

* * *

 

When he woke, Arcee was crouched over him. "Doc! Doc!"

He screamed again, as he felt his internals twist. It was as if he was being split apart from his pelvic struts to his pectoral ridge. His vision dissolved into static.

 

> **> >Installation at 50% ... 51% ... 52% ...**

 

He couldn't think, but he could _remember_. He'd once seen a mechanism with a major virus go into false labor. The virus had triggered the mech to try to deliver a sparkling that didn't exist, with a gestational tank that had not been prepared for delivery over a multi-year gestation period, and the result had been near-fatal damage to the mech's internals. Even with the best medical care available in Iacon, he'd nearly died.

He screamed as he felt wrenching, searing, movement inside his frame.

"RATCHET!"

Oh, yeah, Arcee was here. He should answer her.

 

> **> >55% ... 56% ...**

 

"Get Knock Out!" he gasped out. He didn't want to die. _He didn't want to die._

"I can't raise him on the comms!"

"Get him!" He repeated. "Go!"

She ran out of the room. When he lifted his head, he realized that his door had been blasted open. She'd fired her guns at it, and he hadn't even heard.

 

> **> >60% ... 62% ... 70% ...**

 

The count continued inexorably towards disaster. Something was very wrong. Frantically, he tried to cancel the install, and only succeeded in crashing himself again.

He woke to an ominous message.

 

> **> >Installation Complete**
> 
> **> >Initiating**
> 
> **> >Do Not Shut Down**

 

He screamed as pain gripped his internals, and terror filled his spark. Then his vision fritzed out; he didn't even have the processor power to _see_ as the virus began to change his very operating code. He didn't have a prayer of fighting it. He could only lay gasping on his berth as it went after first his emotional code and then his priority trees. He couldn't even tell precisely what it was doing because he couldn't see his HUD, he could only vaguely sense it.

Abruptly, calm descended over his spark.. It just didn't matter that he could feel his internals splitting apart and his plating sliding open. His transformation cog was working so hard that it was a overheated ball of grisly agony in his chest.

A hot gush of fluids spilled out of his insides. He heard a splash and then a steady liquid tinkle as what he assumed was energon flowed off the berth and onto the ground. The scent of spilled bodily fluids filled his nasal receptors.   

A main energon line had ruptured. That _had_ to be the explanation.

He cried out, illogically, "OPTIMUS!" because he wanted his conjunx. But Optimus wasn't here. He was all alone in a dark room and he was bleeding out and he couldn't even think straight.

He groped his own hand down his abdominal plating, seeking the source of the bleed. He wanted to live, damnit! He had to stop the fluids ... hot, viscous, sticky liquid ran across his fingers. That wasn't energon! 

_What?_

He screamed again, as his internal organs seized in a spasm so hard that it felt as if he was being torn apart inside. Illogically, he bore down with the spasm ... damnit, the virus was trying to get him to tear himself apart!

Something slippery and small slid forth from his insides. He'd probably lost a major internal organ. His fingers brushed against it, but he couldn't get a grip on whatever it was. It was covered in fluids. It slid off the berth, and hit the ground with a crunch.

 

> **> >Carrier protocols initiated**
> 
> **> >Reboot required**
> 
> **> >Shut down in ten seconds**

 

What? No! 

He was dying. He knew he was dying. He couldn't think clearly -- too much strain on his processor -- but he knew he was dying.

Shutting down and rebooting was not going to help. He needed to stop the bleeding!

The process was inexorable, though.

Darkness claimed him.

The reboot only took seconds. When he jerked back to awareness, his head was much clearer. Something catastrophic had clearly happened, but he wasn't dead yet, and when he quickly queried his HUD, his fuel levels were low but not much lower than the level he'd been at when he’d first started showing symptoms. If he'd been bleeding out at the rate he’d earlier assumed, he would have been in the low single digits at best. He was at 30%.

"What the slag?" Ratchet groped his abdominal plating. He could feel his internal organs moving, but they seemed to be knitting back together. He, and the berth, were both covered in a thick and slimy fluid, similar to joint lubricant but more viscous.

He sniffed his fingers. His chemoreceptors identified hormones, salt, protein strands ... not typical components of lubricant, and definitely not of energon. His medical protocols suddenly rebooted, and informed him that he was smelling gestational fluid. 

_What?_

He was incredibly anxious, he recognized. Anxious, but also spoiling for a fight. It felt like combat protocols, only the focus was against everything in the world, not just a known enemy. Everything felt like a threat to that which he must protect.

_What?_

He pushed himself up into a seated position just as a cramp ripped through his insides. It wasn't as strong as the ones that he'd recently experienced, however, and he only groaned in pain. As soon as it passed, he looked down at himself. He was absolutely covered in clear slime, thin trails of glowing purple energon, and waste fluids. He'd purged at some point, maybe when unconscious, and he hadn't even noticed.

His internals clenched, spasmed, and with sheer reflex he bore down. He couldn't possibly be carrying, but his body thought it was, and he wasn't surprised when an amnionic membrance slid forth from inside him. False gestation, maybe? He grabbed for it, nearly dropped it due to the incredibly slippery nature of gestational fluid, and then got a better grip on it.

He expected to see that the inside was smooth and featureless. False carriage wasn't unknown among his species, though it should have been impossible for Ratchet. He was too old! He hadn’t cycled in several years. However, he quickly determined that the membranes had an umbilical port, and though the sack looked a bit small and had too few energon lines embedded in it for full term, the presence of a port indicated there had been a sparkling.

With horror, he remembered the beslimed object he'd tried to grasp earlier. It had slipped free and fallen off the edge of the berth. There had been a crunch. And silence.

With a gasp, he looked over the edge.

There was a puddle of liquid, and in the puddle there was the very tiny form of a sparkling, motionless and grey.

He cried out in alarm, stumbled unsteadily to his feet, and then dropped immediately to his knees beside the infant. Dark eyes stared without sight, and one arm was folded at an obviously broken angle under the body. At first he thought the sparkling -- his sparkling, though he could scarcely believe it! -- was dead. The grief and fierce rage and a thwarted desire to protect at all costs nearly blinded him.

"NO!" he screamed aloud, even as a snarky voice in his processor observed that, yes, his carrier protocols had successfully installed themselves. His emotional reaction went way beyond the horror he would normally feel at the sight of a deceased neonate. It made it hard to think. This was _his_ child. His emotional code knew that, even if his logic centers hadn’t quite caught up.

He seized the child, pulled him into his lap -- he didn't think he had the strength to stand up, and spasms were still shuddering through his internals -- and with near hysterical panic, looked for any signs of life. He didn't expect to find any, though. After a very long war he damn well knew what dead looked like. Been there and done that, even with babies.

Under his skilled fingers, however, he detected the faintest of vibrations and he could hear an unpleasant whine. The sparkling's fuel pump was weak but it had not stopped. By the type of noise it was making, however, he could tell it was pumping air. Full term sparklings were born with energon in their tanks, but preterm neonates did not have any energy reserves. They also lacked the reflex to automatically shut a fuel pump off. Fuel pumps used the energon itself for both cooling and lubrication, so it was a very bad thing if they continued to operate without fluids.

He knew with certainty that this child was premature, and that he was only barely viable. As soon as the umbilicus had broken, he had gone into shock, because his internals just weren’t developed sufficiently.

He swore loudly, even as he reached into his subspace for a bag of medical grade energon. It wasn't a great substitute for sparkling fuel, but it would work to keep the baby's fuel pump from turning itself into thumbnail sized bit of melted slag.

Working with frantic speed, he inserted a syringe through a gap in the tiny sparkling's half-formed armor and directly through the wall of the fuel tank. The tank was barely bigger than his thumb, but the sparkling was so scrawny and his plating was so thin and fragile that he could feel the outline of the tank. He injected what felt like an impossibly small amount of fuel, barely enough for a swallow for him, but that was sufficient to completely fill the tank.

The sparkling's fuel pump immediately ran more smoothly. However, there was no hum of fans, no movement, no respirations. The optics remained dark. The paint nanytes did not change from their corpse-like grey. This was not a good sign, as it indicated the sparkling could not generate his own electrical power, but it was also not unexpected. He’d delivered sparklings this premature before. Only a tiny percentage survived, and fewer without complications.

His carrier protocols were _screaming_ at him, and his medical coding was having a difficult time operating. The two were in conflict over his next course of action.

Ratchet swore again, managed to at least temporarily ignore the carrier code, and after a moment of shaky consideration, he reached into his subspace, and grabbed two electrical leads. They were normally used for spark monitors, but they were the only cables he had that might work. The sparkling's power plant had not come online. He was going to die in seconds of spark containment failure if Ratchet didn't do something.

He scrabbled at the back of his own arm with shaking fingers, ripped a plate of armor off with brute force, then stripped the insulation from two of his own neural lines with a small knife. With frantic haste, he attached the alligator clips on the end of the leads to the bared metal. This hurt, and he didn’t have the spare processor bandwidth nor the time to shut down his own pain receptors, but he probably could have sawed his own legs off without anesthetic right now if it meant saving his child.

Then, with lightning speed, Ratchet pulled out a laser scalpel, cut a slit in the sparkling's thoracic plates, found the main power lines to the power plant, and hooked the sparkling up to his own power.

Instantly, the sparkling looked better. His optics lit, his fans began to whir, and his biolights glowed faintly. Now, however, he was also gurgling as he attempted to draw in air for his power plant. There was gestational fluid in his airway and he wasn’t strong enough to cough it out.

The power plant, now that Ratchet could see it through the incision, was extremely underdeveloped. He didn’t actually need air, but he had a reflex to breath, and the fluid was distressing to the infant, so he started siphoning fluids from the tiny throat.

He was rewarded with the faintest of cries. The sparkling made a tiny mewling noise of pain.

Incredible relief surged through Ratchet's frame. The sparkling -- his sparkling -- was alive! He was crying, and arching his back in distress, which meant he had at least a rudimentary functioning brain module. However, to Ratchet’s horror, he knew his sparkling was in pain from the emergency surgery and Ratchet had no sparkling-safe anesthetics in his subspace.

He’d just done emergency surgery on his _own sparkling_ and his carrier protocols were snarling at him with outrage that he’d _hurt his sparkling_ while his medical code was screaming at him to do several more invasive procedures to _save the sparkling_.

He applied a temporary magnetic bandage to the wound, then cradled the sparkling to his chest over his spark. Both of them were slimed, and covered in energon, and the sparkling's weak cries were a counterpoint to Ratchet’s own sobbing. When had he started crying? He was crying. He never cried.

Arcee appeared suddenly, with a shout, "Doc, I found Knock Out! I found ..."

She slid to a stop in the middle of the room. He realized she'd only been gone a very few minutes. It felt like a lifetime, but according to his chronometer everything had happened so fast it seemed improbable. He sat on the floor, infant held to his chest (so tiny!) and stared at her even as he hiccupped another keening cry and the sparkling mewled.

Noise. The sparkling was making noise. That was good.

He had to be strong for the infant. He forced himself to stop crying. He looked a fool in front of Arcee, and it wasn't helping anything.

He carefully tilted his hand so he could look down at the child. The sparkling was no longer than his hand, with stubby arms and legs. His eyes were barely open and only dimly lit. "Shhh," he said, wishing again that he had anesthetics. The sparkling had to be in agony. The electrical leads that ran from his wrist to the infant swung between them, and he was very careful not to dislodge them. He’d saved his life for the moment, though Ratchet knew that his survival was far from guaranteed.

So tiny. So very, very tiny.

Knock Out rushed through the door shortly after Arcee’s arrival. "Ratchet, what happened?"

He looked up from the sparkling in his hand to the other physician and demanded crossly, "What does it look like?"

What a stupid, stupid question.

Knock Out looked from the fluid-stained berth to the fluid-stained floor to the fluid-stained Chief Medical Officer, and back. "You never told me you were carrying," he said, in a voice of sharp accusation. "Ratchet!"

"I didn't slagging know!" Ratchet said, and when he raised his voice the sparkling mewled louder. "My heat cycles have been irregular for decavorns! They stopped completely five years ago, because I'm too old to have sparklings!"

Knock Out snorted, even as he crouched down in the fluid. He studied in the leads from Ratchet's wrist to the sparkling's chest, and his field filled with shock. He snapped, however, "Are you aware that there's another reason a mech's heat cycles stop besides greatly advanced age, oh wise and geriatric elder?"

"Frag you."

Knock Out ignored that, in favor of producing a pocket scanner. He scanned the infant, then said, "His power plant's definitely not going to be functioning any time soon, he has no autorepair nanytes, and and his fuel pump is damaged -- born dry, was he?"

"Yeah, and I was out cold for a few minutes."

"Slag. Okay. You sit tight. Arcee, get me a gurney. And call Velocity, I'm going to need her, and grab a warming blanket on your way back ..."

After Arcee left, Knock Out sighed. "Ratchet, he's alive. That's a credit to your quick thinking. I'm not sure I could have done what you did."

"He's critical," Ratchet said, far more calmly than he felt. "And we have so few supplies."

 

* * *

 

 

Several hours later, the sparkling was still clinging to life. 

Ratchet, sore and shaken, sat in a chair beside his incubator. The sparkling was barely visible beneath a tangle of electrical lines, fuel lines, and sensors. He was still grey, but it was a warmer shade of grey. He moved, occasionally, and when disturbed he cried. One arm was splinted; he had broken humeral and clavicular struts that would require surgery when he was stronger.

The sparkling was full of pain medication and mildly sedated. With a probably random movement of his unbroken right arm, he had pulled one of the electrical leads loose an hour after birth, and nearly died before they could replace it. They were now welded in place.

The sparkling moved, and woke with a jerk. He whimpered, then cried louder after opening his eyes. The lights overhead were not bright, and but he still squinted in obvious distress. He had been in a dark place his entire existence.

Ratchet reached into the incubator, and stroked his thumb very gently over the premature infant's forehead while shading his optics with the palm of his hand. The sparkling, to his surprise, pressed into his fingers, and his field felt more content.

"Go take a shower. I'll watch him while you're gone," Knock Out said from behind him, firmly but not unkindly.

Ratchet glanced down at his frame, which was still liberally stained with fluids. He'd forgotten what he looked like. He nodded, suddenly too tired to argue. He hurried, though, and returned as soon as he could ... only to find that Knock Out was stroking his infant's arm.

"Don't touch him!" Ratchet snarled, irrationally protective and angry.

Knock Out jumped, and his field flared in surprise. The sparkling whimpered then burst out crying, and the noise was distressingly weak. Knock Out lifted an optic ridge at Ratchet, and did not remove his hand from the sparkling, until Ratchet huffed a sigh.

"Sorry, Knock Out. I'm running on carrier protocols right now."

"Uh-huh," Knock Out said, then added, "and tell your protocols that I'm his treating physician and that I actually do know something about sparklings. Touch calms them. Loud noises and angry fields are not good because they stress the bitlets out. You are not helping your sparkling if you stress him out."

"I know that." Again, he was too loud, and he knew it as soon as he snapped his reply. The baby cried with more urgency, voice thin and high.

Knock Out said firmly, "Come here."

Ratchet might have been willing and able to beat Knock Out into the ground on the field of battle, and he normally ranked the former Decepticon in the med bay. Knock Out, however, had been Chief Medical Officer to a ship full of Decepticons and Ratchet found himself obeying that command voice without second thought. He was not in charge right now.

"Sit." Knock Out said, even as he rose out of the chair.

Ratchet sat.

Knock Out reached into the incubator, very gently picked the sparkling up, and held him out to Ratchet. Ratchet, equally cautious of the tangle of wires attached to the infant, took him gingerly.

As soon as the sparkling was snuggled to his shoulder, however, and sheltered under Ratchet's hand, Ratchet found they were both calmer. The sparkling made a tiny and contented sound and pressed close to Ratchet's armor. He undoubtedly recognized Ratchet’s field and the frequency of his spark and found it soothing.

"He's so tiny," Ratchet said, softly. He was tiny and fragile and frighteningly sick.

"Mm. His gestational age is about five years -- I would have guessed younger, when I first saw him." Full term was six, Ratchet knew, for a mech of his frame size. Knock Out continued, after a moment with his arms crossed, "He's extremely underweight. You've been starving yourself, haven't you?"

Ratchet nodded slowly.

"His small size is due to malnourishment. He's lacked for important minerals and basic energy for his entire gestation. However, I can tell from the state of the amniotic sac, and the way his limbs are curved, that your gestational chamber itself didn't expand as it should have. This was likely due to your age and the fact he’s your first. That's why he came early." Knock Out regarded Ratchet for a long, level moment. "He wasn't able to move much, due to the small size of your chamber, so his limbs didn't develop right."

Ratchet glanced down at the tiny sparkling whose limbs seemed twisted and shortened. He swallowed. He'd seen this before himself, in the offspring of other aging mecha back in his clinic on Cybertron before the war. While it was treatable, the sparkling would likely always have issues with his struts.

Knock Out noted, "I imagine that's why you didn't know you were carrying, though I'm surprised you didn't feel at least some movement."

Stricken, Ratchet recalled, “For the last year or two, I thought my t-cog was acting up. It felt like it was trying to engage randomly. Just little flutters."

"And you didn't get this checked out _why_?"

Ratchet snapped, "Don't! Just ... don't. Don't push me right now."

The sparkling hiccuped what might become a cry of distress if Ratchet continued to yell. He stopped, and stroked the baby's back with one finger.

Knock Out sighed. "Sit there until the bitlet goes back into recharge. Then go recharge yourself. I’d tell you to recharge the whole night, but I know you won’t do that. I don’t want to see you back here for at least four hours. I will stay and watch him while you do."

 

* * *

 

 

It didn't take the sparkling long to drift off into sleep. Ratchet returned him to the incubator, checked every connection on every wire and fuel line twice, and then swallowed down his anxiety and told Knock Out, "You know I'll kill you if anything happens to him." 

Knock Out snorted. "And that's not even carrier protocols talking. Right, Ratch'. Go recharge. I'll let you know immediately if there are any problems."

Sore, frame aching, and with a curiously empty feeling in his spark, Ratchet headed to his quarters. There, the door had already been replaced and somebody had cleaned up the mess. He collapsed into the berth with a tired groan, and did not expect to recharge. Sleep came instantly, however.

 

* * *

 

 

There was always wind at the Well of All Sparks, warm and steady, from the center of Cybertron's core. Optimus stood on the edge of the Well, with the breeze curling around his frame. 

Ratchet found himself before his leader, his lover, his Prime and his conjunx, staring at him with an awed gaze. Optimus wasn't dead. Optimus had come back from beyond death itself. Optimus was standing there with his arms open wide, and a small but welcoming smile on his lips.

Ratchet stumbled forward into that familiar embrace. He buried his face in Optimus's shoulder, and let their fields mingle and flow together. For a moment, he was young again, just graduated from the Iaconian Academy of Medicine, and Optimus was a tall and youthful enforcer. For a moment, the years melted away, and he forgot about the war, and the loss of so many lives, and the devastation of their world. He forgot it all.

He was so tired. Why was he so tired?

"You work too hard," Optimus rumbled, and it was a familiar complaint, "and you deprive yourself, and I worry about you. I told you to take care of yourself, Ratchet."

And then, Ratchet remembered. The sparkling. His sparkling. Premature, sickly, damaged. Broken strut, undeveloped power plant, deformed limbs, fuel pump damaged ... _and it was all his fault._

"I'm sorry, Optimus. I'm sorry. It's all my fault. I've missed you so much, and if I focused on work, always work, more work, I could forget how much it hurts that you're gone and I'm still here."

Optimus's arms tightened around him.

"Optimus, he's so sick and it's all my fault. How could you ever forgive me? He's your child!"

His conjunx pressed a kiss to Ratchet's chevron. "Ratchet, seek redemption, not forgiveness in this matter. Do better going forward, and use this as a lesson."

"I miss your wisdom so much," he admitted.

"His name," Optimus said, "is Undertone, and he is not merely mine. He is both of ours, and you shall ensure that he knows his legacy yet creates a future of his own. He will make both of us proud." 

"Optimus, thank you." He stretched up to kiss him.

Optimus wasn't there. Ratchet stood alone on the lip of the Well of All Sparks.

And then he jerked awake to the cold and empty loneliness that was his quarters. He sat up, and realized it had all been a dream. The sense of Optimus lingered, though, as if Optimus -- and his calm, steady, beloved field -- were still in the room. For a moment, he could almost hear Optimus's words, and it was as if he could look over and see the Prime standing just beside him.

The sense faded, and he dismissed it as a sensor echo.

"Undertone," Ratchet said, aloud.

He had not believed he could conceive. It had never occurred to him that his symptoms were due to gestation. Perhaps it should have, but it hadn't, and he could only move forward.

Ratchet sighed, and rose, and headed for the med bay. Knock Out had to be exhausted, and Ratchet was eager to see his baby.

 

* * *

 

 

Knock Out was there, and so was Arcee. She was bent over, peering into the incubator, but she straightened as he approached. His carrier protocols snarled silently; he told them very firmly that Arcee was no threat. She smiled at him, then hugged him briefly, "It's going to be okay, Ratchet." 

"I hope you're right."

She had no medical training, and she had no idea what complications a premature sparkling could face. There were rust infections, and processor shorts, and optic failures. His damaged fuel pump could fail. His power plant could simply never develop. His respiratory system and cooling systems were compromised and if that happened he could overheat, or develop nanobacterial infections. His autorepair nanytes were nonexistent, so he would be reliant on transfusions for a long time to come. He was at high risk of developing autoimmune and rejection syndromes when his immune system did begin to produce its own nanytes. Even his plating and denta might not develop correctly. They might remain fragile and delicate his entire life.

And that was only the short list of potential problems.

Knock Out rose from the chair and said, "He's been recharging peacefully. Let me know if you need anything, but I am aware you know how to care for premature sparklings."

"Seen plenty." Ratchet settled into the chair. The noise and motion as they traded places made the sparkling rouse; he reached into the incubator and stroked Undertone's undamaged arm. Undertone’s plating was so thin it felt like the metal humans made soda cans out of.

He'd seen plenty of preemies. Some made it. Some didn't. And some survived but with major health issues. As he touched his infant, however, he couldn't help but note that his field was now strong. It was strong, and steady, and stable.

Again, he was reminded of Optimus. For a moment, he felt as if Optimus was in the room. Had he just felt a swirl of Optimus's field against his? No, impossible.

"I bet Optimus is watching over him," Arcee said. She was leaning against a medical berth, arms folded, watching him and the sparkling. "Watching over both of you. He'd do that."

"Superstition," Ratchet replied. He wasn’t sure that he believed in ghosts. Sparks went to the Well after death. There was no logical way a disembodied spark could follow people around, much less have conscious thought and awareness and perception of its environment.

"Maybe, but I believe it," Arcee said, then clapped him on the shoulder as she walked past. "Let me know if you need anything, Ratchet. I'm going to catch some recharge." 

He watched over his sparkling long into the night. Undertone remained stable, however, and by morning his vitals were stronger.

Two days later Undertone had a crisis with a rust infection in his fuel tank, which announced itself quite suddenly in a gush of fluid. His already compromised fuel pump promptly failed as it sucked air and overheated. Undertone spent the next three days with his energon being circulated by external life support, and unfortunately keeping the pressure levels correct on such a tiny and fragile sparkling was impossible.

A small energon line in his brain module ruptured from excessive pressure.

For awhile, they feared they would lose him.

Undertone was strong, however, and rallied. Ratchet spent a night anticipating his sparkling's demise. However, by morning, he was conscious and reacting normally to touch, but utterly silent ... except for the low hum of a working fuel pump.

They had not expected his fuel pump to autorepair itself.

For the first time, Ratchet dared to truly hope.

 

* * *

 

Years passed. 

"Undertone, stay close," Ratchet said, as they approached the edge of the Well of Allsparks.

His youngling trotted after him, short legs working hard to keep up with Ratchet's longer strides over the slightly uneven terrain. At twenty earth years of age, Undertone was now an the equivalent of an elementary age human child  -- but true to Knock Out's predictions, and Ratchet's own fears, he had remained very small. He stood no taller than Ratchet's knees.

"C'mere, kid," Ratchet said, then bent over and picked Undertone up. He boosted him up to his shoulders where he could see better. "That's the Well. Long way down, isn't it?"

Undertone nodded solemnly. He was not completely incapable of speech after years of speech therapy, but he preferred chirolinguistics or sign language to vocalization, and even then he seldom spoke unless pushed into it. Ratchet wasn't sure if that was due to Undertone's minor processor damage as a premature sparkling, or if it was simply personality. He was quite intelligent, and his written language and receptive language were fine.

"I miss him," Ratchet said, to his child, "and I wish you could have known him. You've heard all the stories, of course, from the others. They knew him as Prime, though. To me, long before he became Prime, he was Orion Pax, and he was a dear friend. Let me tell you about the first time we met ..."

He sat, after a bit, as he spoke. There was a convenient outcrop of metal, just right for a seat, and there he settled to tell his child about the mech who was Orion Pax, Optimus Prime, and Undertone's creator.

Undertone sat in his lap, comfortable and quiet, and while Ratchet told him tales he couldn't help but notice how strong and steady Undertone's systems sounded. Undertone was growing up to be healthy, confident, and happy.

After a bit, Ratchet concluded the story, and then rose. For a minute, he swore he felt Optimus's field surrounding them, but surely, that was a sensor echo and his own imagination.

"C'mon, kid," he said, as he set Undertone down. "You've got Circuit Su lessons with Prowl and I have a whole day off work. I'm going to out to dinner with Jackie while you train. I'll pick you up this evening."

Undertone gave him a thumb's up, and then hurried ahead, back towards the nearest road. Away from the Well, Ratchet was not worried about Undertone's safety, so he simply enjoyed watching the kid run. Undertone wasn't just ‘healthy,’ he had grown up to be surprisingly athletic and coordinated despite his small size and short limbs, and every day that seemed like a miracle.

Ratchet lingered a moment beside the Well, gazing into the depths. He wasn't a superstitious mech, and he wasn't sure he even believed that Primus actually listened to their prayers, but after a moment, when Undertone was out of earshot, he said,  "Optimus, I'm so very proud of him. Prowl says he has real potential as a martial artist, and he's doing real good in his studies too. He could be anything he wants to be -- a scientist, a physician, an archivist like you. Anything at all."

A breeze curled around his shoulders, then brushed against his cheek, and it almost felt like a caress. It was surely his imagination.

"Thank you, Optimus," Ratchet said, and then turned, and followed Undertone. He'd promised Wheeljack dinner and a relaxing evening of cards, and he was looking forward to it. After a few hard days of work at the clinic, he needed some rest and relaxation.

 


End file.
